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A few highlights from fossil hunting in the Amberg-Sulzbach county (Bavaria, Germany) in June 2022. There's small abandoned limestone quarries all over the place, picked a couple random ones and found these guys and dozens of more fragmentary bits.

I was able to get out for the first mountain hike this season recently after being held back due to storms. The weather had been too hot the last several weeks to get out in the mountains due to afternoon thunderstorms building up making it hazardous for hiking and to leave an aircraft exposed at 5,000’ elevation. Most of the large pictured ammonites are Pachydiscus sp. so here we go, a photo trip in the Matanuska Formation, Member 3. Yes, it is as steep as it looks. Not for the faint of heart. This particular ammonite has been exposed for three seasons now and too steep to get a closer view. One of my old friends:) A new ammonite from the spring snow melt erosion. This concretion has 4 ammonites present in it. Another “Old Friend”, each season gets a little most erosion around it and subsequent exposures. The suture pattern and description matches Pachydiscus kamishakensis. Where there is one often will be more in close proximity. Pelecypods are present in great abundance but most are fragmented. One of the few pelecypods mostly intact. Another old friend, 26” peleycpod. I have posted pictures of the giant clam previously. I’m going clam digging tomorrow and one like this would do for a years worth of chowder. I have been mainly focused on looking at ammonites and taking my time on this trip started noticing other fossils. This is a piece of a baculite imbedded in a concretion. Once I noticed this one I saw more similar smaller baculite fragments. The backseat passenger looking at an area where belamites occur. The alpine flowers were out in full bloom. Back to the Red and White magic carpet ride to fly home.

Took me awhile to edit this video. My son Cory took waaaaaay too much video of these so I did lots and lots of editing but still had lots of fun putting this one together. Enjoy https://youtu.be/ZLA-1JMkWo8

Last weekend I made a trip to New Mexico to hunt the Rio Puerco Valley with @PFOOLEY in search of Upper Cretaceous ammonites, mostly in the middle Turonian Carlile Shale. Mike is incredibly knowledgeable about the Upper Cretaceous of New Mexico and the stratigraphy of the area and I had a blast collecting alongside him. Before making my way to New Mexico I had told Mike that my goal was to find a Placenticeras. Placenticeras and Sphenodiscus are my two favorite Upper Cretaceous ammonite genera. Despite Mike's warning that the areas we would look had been consistently collected over the years, I was excited to explore a new area and collect some new fossils for my collection. Going into the trip, I had told myself that if anything I would get to spend a weekend collecting amongst a beautiful surrounding. I met Mike early on Saturday before we made our way to the Carlile Shale. After we exchanged some quick pleasantries, Mike gifted me an amazing Placenticeras pseudoplacenta embedded in a large concretion. At the very least, I was not going to leave New Mexico without my Placenticeras! Once we arrived at the site, Mike explained to me which horizons hold the best fossils and what color concretions I should be looking for. He also said that rattlesnakes can be found out here and that he hoped we would see one -- that made one of us. I am happy to report that we did not see one! With Mike's two dogs guiding the way, we found ourselves over the next several hours climbing up and down several slopes on the hunt. Given that we were in the Prionocyclus hyatti zone, Prionocyclus hyatti made up the majority of our finds, but to both of our surprise, we were still able to find quite a variety. I found a couple Placenticeras pseudoplacenta of my own as well as two "Franken-ite" ammonites that I wrapped and glued back at home, including an uncommon Romaniceras mexicanum. Mike found his first ever Scaphites carlilensis, which was cool to see. Prionocyclus hyatti Placenticeras pseudoplacenta Romaniceras mexicanum Indeterminate Collignoniceratid While the ammonites were the obvious draw to the site, I also enjoyed picking up a couple of the other invertebrates lying around the hills, including a double valve Inoceramus howelli. Cameleolopha bellaplicata Cyprimeria sp. Nuculana sp. Inoceramus howelli After walking the full stretch of the exposure, Mike said that he wanted to check out one more site, an exposure of the Santonian Satan Tongue, before heading home. Once again Mike gave his fair warning that he had only found a few fossils in the past from this formation but that he had always thought it worthwhile to check it out as a last stop before calling it a day. As we walked around I could see why he had given his warning. I could find nothing! Mike came up to me to ask how I was doing and when I said I was empty handed, he handed me to my surprise two Baculites codyensis and showed me an interesting oyster he had picked up. I have no idea how he could find these things! Baculites codyensis We walked around a little bit more, and just as Mike said "I hope this stop was not a waste of time," I spotted a Placenticeras syrtale peeking out of the ground. I quickly called Mike over, and as soon as I looked at the ground again, I saw another one less than half a foot away from the first. We spent a few more minutes searching this horizon and each collected a few more pieces. Placenticeras syrtale Shortly thereafter Mike left me to head home for dinner, but before he did, he pointed me in the direction of another area worth checking out. Mike must have the magic touch for ammonites, because after he left I did not find much else. Nonetheless I still managed to find another Prionocyclus hyatti and a couple other invertebrates. Prionocyclus hyatti Pecten sp. Cardium sp. Eoacteon sp. Before flying back home in the afternoon on Sunday I wanted to make one more effort at finding some ammonites. Returning to an area Mike and I had visited the day before I decided to go right while we had gone left. That decision turned out to be a poor one. I spent the next hour hiking with nothing to show for it except a few isolated broken Prionocyclus hyatti chunks that I left where I found them. Believing that I might not find anything for my day, I made my way back towards my starting point, and just as I arrived there, I spotted an interesting concretion on the ground. Crouching down to examine it, I decided to split it open. No luck. Just more tiny Prionocyclus hyatti fragments. But as I spun around from my seat I saw what looked like the shell of a decapod. Mike had joked with me the day before that he had found a crab in association with an ammonite several years ago and when he donated it the researchers had wanted to break off the ammonite to preserve the crab. He said that decapod material is rare, so I did not have much hope of finding one myself. The concretion had broken into four pieces so I made sure to collect everything and wrap them appropriately. Since returning home and consolidating the specimen, I have struggled to identify it. Yesterday I spoke with one academic who asked to see it in-person. I will report back once I have a definitive identification. Unidentified Decapod All in all, I had a great time in my short visit collecting from the Upper Cretaceous of New Mexico. I found some great fossils and multiple personal trip makers. I cannot thank Mike enough for his hospitality and generosity. I cannot wait to pay him back on a potential trip to the Upper Cretaceous of the Atlantic Coastal Plain. As a funny aside, I did not have enough space in my checked bag for all of my finds, so I had to store a couple of them in the two backpacks I carried onto the plane. TSA pulled one bag aside but not the other, and when the agent came to look at the bag closer, she asked me, "are these rocks?" My guess is that TSA agents see a lot of things come through security, but "rocks" was a first for her.

These are some finds of mine made on the Yorkshire coastline... It would be truly spectacular to have very specific identifications for all of them - and even the ones that 'just' turn out to be regular stones and rocks! Regarding most, I think they're quite fragmentary... Key: 1-9 = Everything up to the first Ammonite 10-18 = Ammonite material? 19-26 = Alternative shells 27-29 = 'Olympus Mons'/multilayered rocks 30-35 = Other

I did this prep some years ago, about 10?, and it came out purty dang good. Video is 1 minute 51 seconds https://youtu.be/IkR2SccEdrQ

Hello all. After a long break, I would like to show some examples of the Sinemurian Jurassic from my collection. The Sinemurian Stage (Sinemur) is a stratigraphic subsection, the second from the bottom stage of the lower section of the Jurassic system of the Mesozoic era. Covers time from 199.3 ± 0.3 Ma to 190.8 ± 1.0 Ma. As far as I know, these fossils are not very widespread. Arietites (Coroniceras)?.. I am not sure about these ammonites

Hello all... I want to invite everyone here to the second in this year's Tate Museum Spring Lecture Series. Next Thursday, March 31, the Tate Geological Museum will be doing the second in the year's Spring Lecture series via Zoom. Dr. Josh Slattery, from the University of South Florida, will speak on ecology of Cretaceous ammonites found in our part of the country: "The Ecological Role of Ammonites in Late Cretaceous Seas of North America" The presentation starts at 7PM, Mountain Time. We will open the zoom at 6:30 for anyone who wants to socialize (or just say hello and then not socialize). : ) And... here is the link: https://caspercollege.zoom.us/j/83611694009 which is also on the museum's website and Facebook page. Hope to see a few of you there. Cheers, JPC

Long time no see guys! Thought I’d come back with a bang. A few months back I headed out, just after recovering from covid, so of course, not back at 100%, but well enough to get some exercise. Of course, the first thing I stumble on, is a rather large nodule. Now, these nodules don’t normally contain anything, and are usually filled with a calcite core, but always fun to hit regardless. After one tap with the hammer, it revealed a cross section of a rather large ammonite known as Harpoceras (falciferum). Not a super rare Ammonite by any means, but definitely uncommon. I lost my head. The thing weighed A LOT. So it was bagged up, and on I had to walk for almost two miles. A rough walk back to say the least. Had to weigh the bag when I got home. The block alone weighed over 5 stone (33kgs). That excludes hammers and chisels etc, thanks @LiamL for carrying the rest of my fossils for me haha. Time to prep. There was a lot of matrix to remove, so some cuts were made with the angle grinder to shorten the time of prep down . Then pen down. Until I finally reveal the first large ammonite seems I knew where it was sat. After a few more angle grinder cuts to the other half of the nodule, I actually found a 2nd large Harpoceras. Missing it by about 2mm. VERY LUCKY. Also very happy of course. Though now prep time was increased more so, plus it was sat at the most awkward angle possible, but we persevere. Easily my most challenging prep to date. I have also been filming the prep, every last step of the way to document it. I took a few weeks off recently to concentrate on some customer prep, and to give my hands rest from the thing. So here’s where it sits currently. Both ammonites are fully exposed. The second needs the middle finishing, though saving the for last as it’s incredibly sticky and that awkward angle makes it all the more difficult. I’ll be sure to update in the comments once it’s finished. So yeah, hope you all enjoyed that long winded post. It’s certainly a labour of love, and I hope I don’t find another one again soon (liar). Dan

Anybody know what these are?

Warm day, not muddy now, the Clay was cracked into convenient units for searching. There usually are some pyratised Ammonites, but the preservation of these is beautiful and odd. It might be to do with the amount of rain we've had acting with pyrite - I don't know. I really like the colours and the attached white Serpula worm.

Recent finds from Texas! Ammonites from the Goodland limestone, petrified wood and ice age stuff bank gravel of the Brazos river, either Beaumont or Lissie formations, or from a terrace deposit. The rib is mammoth/mastodon, the vertebra and hoof core bison, the antler is likely whitetail deer, and the teeth are horse and bison, with the small one I think a 3-toed horse based on the images I looked up.

I got the chance to go to the Oxford Clay twice over the last few days. I'm always looking for echinoderms at this site, and I prefer this one in winter when the vegetation has died back and I can spot lots of small, delicate detail. These are some if my favourite finds from the last few days.

I'm trying to get to one Oxford Clay site pretty frequently, and it did not disappoint. I found my best gastropods from the site this weekend. I thought I had found two pieces of crinoid, but when I got home found it was four. More ammonite as well. Even better, I managed to not bring home any living creatures. Last time I had a caterpillar clinging to an ammonite.

While 2021 was an extremely difficult year with coivd and the loss of my mother we were able to make it out to Richmond in NW Queensland for 2 fossil digs. The conditions out here can very harsh 40c plus days so we did a bit of night time digging under lanterns to avoid the heat. The material here is marine cretaceous sediments from the Toolebuc formation. Our goals this year was to finally find a large ichthyosaur bone (I have found 2x isolated teeth in the past) and find a NW Queensland ammonite. Below are some of best finds from the two digs. While the ichthyosaur bone eluded us for another year while going through our material we brought home we found what has been ID as a Pterosaur digit bone which we were very excited about as these are rare in Australia as is by far my most exciting find to date the fossil is approx 8cm long. Another rare fossil from the site is Johnlongia shark tooth we have found average condition teeth in the past but this year we found a very well preserved one. While turtle fossils are very common on this site we did find our first almost complete one however it was very fragile so decided the best option was to leave it in the location we found it . (Sorry these pictures were taken at night so are not very good) Another very common fossil is fish remains however we found our best fish jaw to date this took quite a few hours to prep. Lastly I was determined to find at least one Ammonite these are not found in our usual site so after been given some guidance and contacting land owners we were given permission to hunt on a station which was well known for ammonites and it didn't disappoint we made some nice finds. The best part of the fossil hunting this year was spending quality time with my son who loves doing it too, thanks for reading my run down of this year collecting I hope everyone has a great 2022. Cheers

Happy Fossil Friday everyone! In today's video offering, I sneak across the border into Texas to hunt for those Texas-sized ammonites, and I met another YouTuber on the way.

During the Christmas holiday we had the opportunity to go on 2 field trips to the north of France. 1st one was just after Christmas when we visited the Turonian part of the cliffs. Here we found a couple of nice ammonites ( Mammites nodosoides and a realy nice Fagesia catinus ) and a big flint echinoid. (with @Natalie81 and @Euhoplites) The second trip was last weekend, but we had no luck with the weather this time and we had heavy rainfall for most of the day. Also lots of competition that day. Not a lot of fossils to be found that day: a small flint echinoid, a big Mariella sp. but not the best preservation and an Acanthoceras, but this one is still completely in the matrix, I don’t know how this one will turn out. pic's from the 1st day: The echinoids from the construction site: Fagesia catinus all cleaned up the 2nd field trip: a wel hidden Acanthoceras rhotomagense: Rain, rain, rain,.. I almost forgot, Best wishes for 2022 to all the forum members

Hey All During my prep of another ammonite I found these two small guys. Are they infant ammonites or gastropods? Planko

Hello everyone! Been almost 2 years since I last visited that site and left in situ a nice multiblock. I was thinking again and again @taj reply and tried to correct that mistake. However, every year the site seems to be less accessible and there are rumors that it's forbidden to search there for fossils due to the proximity of the archeological site of the theater, regardless the fact the outcrop is located within private land. Nevertheless, last Saturday 13/11 we visited the place with a friend. Visited 3 possible outcrops without much results. 1. Carnian exposure with partially pyritized ammonites - overexploited, zero finds. 2. Ammonitico Rosso quarry, no finds but for some slices on marble blocks. 3. Around the theater, near that private place. One nice slice of the Rosso early Jurassic quarry. 100kgs of boulders collected in order to be cleaned. This outcrop has very high density of fossils, due to the absent of sediments, leading in amazing multiblocks full of ammonites, nautiloids and orthoconics. The obvious characteristic of this formation is th presence of Mn oxide, which gives this lovely dark brown/rusty color. Smaller blocks were also collected. Presence of fossils indicate high possibility to find more after abrasion. Before leaving, we visited the museum and bought some prepared ones. You can see how packed are. I tried to find another exposure of Hallstatt facies so I had to find a map, which does not exist online. Found a governmental library and bought it! Next Saturday 20/11 we visited again Epidaurus area. Using a ruler, I put all possible outcrops on my phone, so we were prepared. Unfortunately, all these outcrops were not accessible or altered due to agriculture, buildings and so on. Out of 13 visited locations, none gave fossils. We found another Ammonitico Rosso, but the quality was poor due to tectonic dynamics and extreme deformation. Sunday 21/10, a third visit to the place with another friend. We started locating an outcrop with Miocene gastropods. Near that place, we found another site with some Cretaceous imprints of Pectenoids Then we joined with another guy and headed to search again in that overexploited locality. My friend found a partial Carnian ammonite replaced by jasper and gave it to me. I don't keep partials anymore, but this is really beautiful and rare. The same guy found a nice 4-5cm Johannites sp laying on the ground. It was steinkern but still lovely! Moved further to explore the place a little more and we found something like stromatolites, composed of Mn oxide, limestone of the same fossiliferous site around the theater and possibly, ammonites with complete replacement with Mn oxide.

Fossil Friday once again! This is the last of the South Dakota exploration trip, hunting the Pierre shale for cephalopods and hopefully a mosasaur. Although the first half of the Pierre shale exploration went pretty slow, it wasnt without a few nice finds. The second part, we were extremely fortunate in that we got to meet Neal Larson and hear a short talk about the local Pierre shale formation, and then he took us out to his personal hunting site.

Hello everyone. Proposing a trade of NSR miscellaneous stuff for trade for ammonites. I have mosy verts, gastropods, calcite covered gastropods, calcite covered clams, couplebfish verts, one more tylosaurus tooth, sharks teeth, etc.. Tell me what you want and I'll see if I have it.

Hi everyone These two pieces were collected by my boyfriends father and his family about 60 years ago on the Jurassic coast of Charmouth/Lyme Regis. A little while ago he brought them out to show me and said I could keep the ones I liked. I chose these two, but not to keep. My idea was to prep them, reveal the fossils inside and give them to him at Christmas. I used a Dremel with specialised tips and a sewing needle in a pin vice under a microscope. Overall I'm quite happy with how they turned out, not perfect, but I can see my own improvement. The larger single ammonite (Promicroceras sp. I think) had significant pyrite rot on the matrix on the reverse side. I removed it with the Dremel and will coat the ammonite and the reverse side with Paraloid. As you can see, the matrix split beside the ammonite whilst I was Dremelling. It would be great to hear opinions on whether you think the piece looks better with the matrix glued back on, or left alone? I would love to hear any advice and critical feedback. Before: The reverse side After an hour or so on the Dremel: The reverse side, after removing the pyrite rot: All finished after a bit more Dremel work and about 2 hours with a needle (no Paraloid yet though): With the excess matrix: Without the excess matrix: The second piece, before: After an hour or two with a needle: After about 40 mins with the Dremel: All finished after a few more hours with a needle and some Paraloid to glue back the broken pieces and stabilise: